Transit Ads Promote Citizen Surveillance For 2010 Olympics

"An advertising campaign aimed at warning transit users to report suspicious activity was launched recently by TransLink in the lead-up to the Vancouver Olympic Games.

The print campaign, which features ads placed on transit sites, encourages citizens to keep tabs on each other by reporting potential security threats.
Using the catchphrase, "Report the suspicious, not the strange," it was launched on Monday and is modelled after a program in the U.S. created after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

In one ad, a man is shown taking a photo of a transit security camera. Ken Hardie from TransLink said that example would be a cause for concern.
"They're taking pictures of wiring, pipes, electrical panels. Well, I'm sorry, not many people go around doing that."

Richard Smith, a communications professor at Simon Fraser University, wonders if such public surveillance goes too far.

"You're asking people to make judgments about others' behaviour," said Smith. "What makes something suspicious — is it the clothes I wear, the colour of my skin? How far do we go down that path?""

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